


Universal

by navigatorsghost



Category: The Transformers (Cartoon Generation One)
Genre: Canon Typical Shenanigans, Gen, Snark
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-18
Updated: 2018-07-18
Packaged: 2019-06-12 06:17:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 396
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15333666
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/navigatorsghost/pseuds/navigatorsghost
Summary: Rodimus Prime really isn't the mech for covert ops. And now he's got caught, so there's only one thing for it...





	Universal

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on my Unicronian blog: [of-fire-and-light.tumblr.com](https://of-fire-and-light.tumblr.com).

Rodimus Prime wasn't good at stealth. He hadn't been great at it before he got the Matrix, becoming several sizes bigger and heavier hadn't helped, and if someone was going to go and spy on the Decepticons it probably shouldn't have been him. But, what did they say, you should never give an order you wouldn't be willing to follow - so he sneaked around another of Charr's endless landscape of broken buildings, trying to get a better view of the fortified energon depot in the valley below him-

" _Prime!_ What are you doing here?!"

Okay, it was one thing to be bad at stealth, but he really needed some remedial training if he'd managed to let _Galvatron_ sneak up on _him_. He stared up the length of Galvatron's cannon, watching the stars behind the warlord's shoulder shimmer in the heat haze above it; he looked into narrowed carmine optics, at the sharp-angled downturn of Galvatron's mouth, and came up blank. "Uh - bah-wheep-grah-na-wheep-nini-bong?"

Galvatron's expression did something decidedly peculiar, but the muzzle of the cannon actually wavered by a few centimetres. " _Bah-wheep-grah-na-wheep-nini-bong?_ " he repeated, with impressive scepticism.

Rodimus, flying high on mechadrenaline and pure nerve, grinned at him. "What, Decepticons don't know the universal greeting?"

"The what?"

"It's something Kup taught me. Supposedly you can make anyone friendly to you just by saying it. And, uh, then you're supposed to offer them an energon goodie." A quick twist of his wrist to flick the dispenser out of his storage pocket, and he held it out to Galvatron. "Want one?"

"That's the most ridiculous thing I've _ever_ heard!" But Galvatron's glare had cracked into a grin despite himself, and he lowered the cannon and reached out to take the energon goodie instead. "What's it even supposed to mean?"

"I don't think it means anything," Rodimus admitted. "I think it just confuses people for long enough that they forget they meant to kill you." He grinned back. "It worked on you, didn't it?"

" _-dammit, Prime!_ "

Okay, he'd pushed his luck too far. Rodimus turned, transformed, and fled for his life, cannonfire stitching the ground at his tail. At least he'd bought himself enough time to _try_ and get away.

He didn't begrudge Galvatron the energon goodie, though. Based on what his infiltration attempt had revealed before he got caught, Galvatron had almost certainly needed it more than he did.


End file.
